[Foundation-l] thoughts on leakages

[Florence Devouard]

Ray Saintonge wrote:
> Florence Devouard wrote:
>> It has been mentionned several times that information provided on 
>> private lists was leaked publicly.
>>
>> Arguably, private lists are populated by individuals who care about the 
>> projects, who want to help, and who are trusted.
>>
>> Once information starts leaking, it may imply three things
>>
>> 1) There is information worth being known.
>> It is possibly fine. Some information is good to share. Other 
>> information is best kept confidential, at least for a while.
>>
>> 2) Trusted people feel that this information should be public, or at 
>> least in part more public than it actually is.
>> This suggests that the core community may not fully agree on where the 
>> treshold for confidentiality is located. Another interpretation is that 
>> they feel confidentiality would normally be fine, but object with the 
>> decisions taken. So, it may be either protest against the process, or 
>> against the result.
>>
>> 3) They give info to third parties, instead of asking if they can 
>> publish, or instead of forwarding the information themselves, which 
>> suggest they fear backslash, and that freedom of speech is losing a bit 
>> of ground.
>>
>> I found interesting that the only action points suggested have been to 
>> 1) decrease information proposed to private lists or to 2) decrease 
>> number of people on the private lists or to 3) create more private 
>> private lists.
>>
>> No one has suggested to actually look at reasons why there are leaks.
> I'm inclined to rely on the old maxim, "Don't attribute to malice what 
> you can attribute to ignorance.  In many situations I don't think that 
> the intentionalities are as clear as what you perceive them to be. I 
> don't completely discount free speech crusaders or malicious moles, but 
> I would look for easier solutions first.
> 
> I've suggested a two-prong approach before:
>     1. Make sure that *all* information which should be made public is 
> made public in a timely manner.
>     2. Have very clear definitions of what kind of things should be 
> confidential.
> 
> I agree that the superficial proposals made to you do not really address 
> the problems.  You can't expect people to protect confidentiality if 
> they don't know what it is.  Remember too that a lot of the Wikipedia 
> activists are relatively young, and have not had the experience of 
> dealing with business confidentiality; it needs to be spelled out.
> 
> Transparency is important to maintaining confidentiality.  That may seem 
> paradoxical, but it is essential to building the confidence that the 
> Board is acting in the interests of the community, however you want to 
> define 'community'.
> 
> When the Board appointed Erik to his paid deputy director's position it 
> created a political disaster for itself.  Sure, you might say that it 
> was Sue's call, but the Board always has, or at least should have, the 
> power to veto any specific hire.  It becomes a responsibility when the 
> political optics are wrong.  The storm that arose when it was thought 
> that Danny might win a seat on the Board should have been a warning.  
> Neither Danny nor Erik have been strangers to controversy.  Even after 
> the hiring the Board could have mitigated the damage by adopting a 
> six-month waiting period before a Board member could join the staff, 
> with the six-months to start from the anticipated end of the elected 
> term so that it cannot be accelerated by an early resignation.  When 
> someone is elected for a specific term the electorate expect him to 
> finish that term.  When these kinds of hirings happen, they leave the 
> impression, rightly or wrongly, that there is no transparency, and 
> perception is everything.

I want to have this crystal clear, as there is absolutely no lack of 
transparency on this very specific point.

The board did not appoint Erik to his paid deputy director's position. 
Period.

It was Sue's decision. I am not aware that the board has any veto on 
such matters. We have made it clear to Sue that she is in charge of 
hiring and firing staff members, so that she can freely organize the team.

There are only two ways for the board to get involved in such matters.
One is approving various policies, such as the "non discrimination 
policy", or giving various strategic guidelines, such as "try to hire a 
mix of american and non-american staff".
The other is to change ED if the board is not happy with the ED.

We have discussed the policy for the 6-months hiring delay in october, 
but it was not approved because there was no strong consensus. We 
actually mostly disagreed on the terms (6 months, 12 months) and 
applicability (board -> staff or staff -> board or both).
We discussed against the issue of approving the policy after Erik was 
hired, and the consensus was to not adopt this policy at the moment. Not 
because we do not think it would be generally a good idea to adopt this 
policy, but largely because it would be perceived as a reaction of 
protection and upset related to Erik being hired, and most members did 
not want to damage his authority and his ability to join the staff.

> While I have your attention . . . :-)
> (I know.  I have this fault of thinking too long before I say things.)
> 
> I have supported the idea of a Wikicouncil from the very beginning, and 
> I'm sure that somewhere in the bowels of the mailing lists there remains 
> a record of my suggestion for bicameral governance back when the first 
> by-laws were being discussed.  The question of how to determine 
> membership on such a council will remain vexed for a long time, and I 
> think it will only be settled after a long period of trial and error.  
> In the early stages I would make the membership fairly open ended, with 
> just enough restriction on membership to keep it from becoming 
> unmanageable.  Both appointive and democratic methods for choosing 
> members have their own problems. I would suggest that the first members 
> be appointed from among the most senior and most experienced 
> wikimedians; they could draft provisional policies.  A first in-person 
> meeting could take place in Alexandria.  Would financial encouragement 
> to get them there be any less worthwile than getting the advisory board 
> to Taipei?

Seems like a good idea actually...

> One of the first responsibilities that I would attach to the Wikicouncil 
> would be joint responsibility for the by-laws.  Changes to the by-laws 
> would need to be passed by both the Board and the Council.  This would 
> allow the Board to examine changes from a business perspective, and the 
> Council to view them from a community perspective.

I do not think that an external council can get the authority to change 
the bylaws, however, it certainly would be a great idea that the council 
propose changes, which the board will approve (or not).

Part of the current broken situation is that the board is small and has 
limited availabilities to propose and draft new policies, new bylaws, 
new guidelines. I am very happy when some trusted members help us draft 
a good resolution. It would be great if the wikicouncil could help on this.

Look, I have a suggestion. In the bylaws, if you look at 
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Bylaws#ARTICLE_VI_-_ASSETS, the 
content of this part of the bylaws is rather limited.

What are our assets ? In my opinion, Cash (in various states), servers, 
a bit of office stuff, domain names and trademarks.

Are they other things which are assets ? Could we mention these specific 
things (in particular trademarks and domain names) in our assets ? Does 
that make sense ? Is that possible to add in the bylaws that assets can 
not be sold or traded with exclusive deals unless authorized by a 
resolution of the Board of Trustees ?

Does that make sense ? If so, can someone help draft a resolution in 
that sense ?


Ant